


Phlegethon

by TheFire_in_the_NightSky



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alchemy, Alternate Universe, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Cullen is a prince, Curses, Dark Fairy Tale Elements, Dorian is still a mage, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Smut, Familiars, Light Horror, M/M, Mentions of Blood, Mild Gore, Poisoning, Resurrection Spells, Snakes, ancient creatures, and Halward and Aquinea suck more than usual, blood for ritual, creating Tevinter lore for this AU, epigraphs, hand waving Thedas lore, hand waving some historical stuff from the Middle Ages too, inspired by the Brothers Grimm, not blood magic, talking sneks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-15
Updated: 2019-01-05
Packaged: 2019-09-18 15:35:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16997736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheFire_in_the_NightSky/pseuds/TheFire_in_the_NightSky
Summary: A dark fairy tale AU taking some inspiration from the short story, The Three Snake-Leaves by The Brothers Grimm - not part of any Dragon Age game canon.Tevinter Ambassador to the South, Dorian Pavus, ran off to Ferelden to secretly marry the country's Prince, Cullen Stanton Rutherford.  Dorian proudly tells his parents the news, but instead of sharing in their son's happiness, they poison his husband and lock Dorian within his crypt, having drained his magic with magebane and fashioned him with some sort of collar that blocks him from his mana and cuts his tie to the Fade for good measure.“Until the last breath is drawn from my chest, youcannotmake me part from him."Oh, how his parents took his words to heart...At a loss of what to do and weakened by grief and the loss of his magic, Dorian gives in to the heartbreaking reality and horror that he'll be spending his last days withering away with only his husband's magically preserved corpse for company...or so he thinks.Salvation may come in the unlikeliest of forms, and death undone in the strangest of ways.





	1. Part I: In the Field of Mourning

**Author's Note:**

> _"Now when the dead have come to the place where each is led by his genius (daimon), first they are judged and sentenced . . . Those who are curable, but are found to have committed great sin . . . these must needs be thrown into Tartaros, and when they have been there a year the wave casts them out, the homicides by way of Kokytos, those who have outraged their parents by way of **Pyriphlegethon**."_
> 
> \- Plato, _Phaedo (On the Soul)_

 

 

 _“Until the last breath is drawn from my chest, you_ cannot _make me part from him.”_

Dorian laughed bitterly at the memory.  The sound was empty and devoid of anything but anger - for himself and for trusting, somehow, that his parents would not stoop _this_ low.  He recalled the day after his clandestine wedding vividly -  abhorrence burning beneath his skin as his father stared blankly at him there upon the dais; his mother’s face stuck in that catatonic sneer she always had as long as Dorian could remember.  It had felt liberating, vindicating even, as he made damn sure to gesture with his left hand for even more dramatic effect than usual - letting the gold of the fede ring upon his finger glint in the light.

And oh, how his parents took his words to heart.

He twisted and spun the metal around his ring finger as he laughed through heated tears of frustration.   _What a cruel sense of irony,_ he thought.  Dorian removed his ring, and then the one it kept in place that was just a little too big - its match.  Placing his own back upon his finger, he held the other ring up, inspecting it in the pale glimmer of green from the veilfire torch he sat beneath.  His tear-blurry vision refocused passed the engraved band to the simulacra carved into the sides of the blighted, raised stone slab that now held the covered burden of his days-dead husband.

“Well, amatus,” Dorian began as he hefted himself off the cold ground.  “when I’d told you nothing could possibly take me from your side _\- and do forgive me for this,_ but… this isn’t quite what I had in mind.”  He sniffled and wiped his eyes as he approached the ghostly form draped in soft scarlet.

Dorian let his trembling hand trail Cullen’s too-still body just enough to feel the shift of fibres in the velvet beneath the pads of his fingers.  He stopped once he got to the gold circlet lain upon his breast. The flicker of shadows and light played upon the rubies encrusting the eyes of a lion’s head at the front of it, making it appear - to Dorian’s dismay - very much as if it were giving him a bit of a sardonic wink.

Picking up the circlet, Dorian thumbed the varying dips and curves of the lion’s mane, the filigree and acanthus leaves swirling and flowing together to weave this now useless piece of metal.   _Just more useless metal,_ Dorian told himself with a cold flutter in his chest.

He set it back down over Cullen’s heart and sighed heavily.  As he picked up the drape of velvet from over Cullen’s left hand, Dorian sucked in a breath that coaxed a crack to split in his already fragile composure.  Cullen’s skin was white as the fluted marble columns that climbed the crypt’s walls. Before he could stare any longer and feel exactly what that paleness meant, Dorian picked up his husband’s hand and slid his ring on with a bit too much ease.

He re-covered Cullen’s hand and backed away, doubling over with his hands upon his knees.  Dorian’s breath came in pants as he looked back up at the dulled effigy of his heart of hearts.  Quickly, he walked back towards the entrance of the crypt and, trying for the umpteenth time, knowing it would be in vain _again -_ to desperately open the magically sealed doors.  Green magic flickered across the dark wood as the sounds of Dorian jarring it violently on its heavy hinges echoed through the chamber.  Dorian muttered curses beneath his breath as he gave up, hands once more going to the fucking collar around his neck.

 _“If I get out of here, I will make damn sure you both are dragged to the deepest, abyssal depths of the Void, you dreadful, horrifying excuse for humans,”_ Dorian whispered vehemently to the dank shadows.

 

They’d both been poisoned and doomed by his family in some form - a delightful wedding present.  Truly heartfelt, no?

Unfortunately, Dorian had had business to attend to with his secretive Lucerni party back in Minrathous weeks after the wedding, and had assured Cullen he would only be gone as long as he needed to be.  They’d started making a quiet life for themselves in a modest cottage on the outskirts of the small village of Honnleath. It was a quiet neither of them were used to; Dorian usually wrapped up in Tevinter politics and rebellions with Maevaris and their gaggle of do-gooders by his side, and Cullen forever tied to the royal obligations of being one Prince of Ferelden trying to dissolve the tarnished, and more than a little religiously overzealous, Templar Knight Order in his “spare” time.

It had been _nerium -_ oleander - magically disguised in the bottle of Aggregio Pavali sent as a fatal last resort to wipe the smear from the Pavus name after Dorian’s parents received their substantial dowry.  The dowry that they no doubt used to pay off the scum who’d poisoned the wine that drained the life from his dear amatus in his absence. It was meant to do the both of them in, clearly, and Dorian can only imagine the enraged displeasure his parents faced once they’d realised their sole, prodigal disappointment of an heir had inadvertently given their plan the slip by walking around undetected, _right under their noses,_ in the crumbling capital city of Tevinter.

No one would point the finger of course, no.  Assassins in the Imperium were hired over a cup of tea by the hearth as if entertaining the company of an old friend, laughing at the expense of whatever poor sod would soon meet their untimely end with the simple exchange of a bag of gold and perhaps a few tesserae.

Hired hands were common.  They were _expected._

Someone show up to your celebratory, fifteen-course birthday dinner dressed in last year’s fashions, throwing off the exuberant splendor the rest of your congregated partygoers are creating in their lavish robes and gowns?  Have them stabbed in their own horse carriage on the way home. Some Magister always one-upping you? Oh, take his much sought-after seat in the Magisterium once you’ve paid someone to have it look like a vengeful slave put a viper in their bedchamber!  

Is your defiant son, who won’t play the part, undoing the narrow-mindedness and bigotry of your country, whilst running off to marry a Southern prince _\- a man, mind you -_ who just so happens to also be a former Templar?  Let’s not forget the shame your stubborn whelp brought upon the both of you with his traitorous heroics as Ambassador to the Imperium (where he met this handsome heir to the Fereldan throne), just gallivanting around, fighting battles that went against the Tevinter grain!   _What a laughing stock he’s made you._ We could just poison a bottle of wine and send it as an act of good faith, no more bad blood; cause the happy couple a vile sickness that puts them in a comatose state until their withered, weak bodies give out.  Yes, _that._ How much coin will that put us back?  Ah, no matter.

Now, what _inconvenience_ Dorian must have caused his parents, to not be in Ferelden with his new husband at that time!

 _Damn it all, we’ll have to catch him at the wake at Castle Rutherford then!_ he imagined them grumbling.

Actually, no… Dorian didn’t know when or _what_ had been laced with magebane exactly, but he knew it happened the day of Cullen’s funeral.  Perhaps it was the woman he’d not recognised (though he must admit there were many gathered to bid their beloved Prince safe passage into the After that Dorian had never so much as breathed the same air, much less held a conversation with) that gathered him in her arms to usher him outside for some fresh air while he was so very beside himself with grief.  He thinks he recalls her getting him a goblet of wine to calm his raw nerves. At this rate, Dorian was ready to give up the drink entirely because he couldn’t trust it, more’s the pity.

Then he woke here of course; collared and magically castrated, and still devoid of half his soul.  It could be a little worse, he thought. They could have made him _Tranquil._ But of course they wouldn’t - Halward and Aquinea surely wanted their son to feel the full effects of what they’d done to him; to have Dorian know that they could even control the arrangement his death if they so chose.

That line of thinking caused deep shivers to crawl up his back and and across his shoulders.  Despite the string of bad luck wine had brought him recently, he ached for a drink or five to calm his mind and ease his trembling hands.

Well, he’d have to get out of this cold crypt if he wanted to think about drowning his sorrows in any sort of spirit ever again.

All of this because Dorian always had to be that contrarian Tevinter Altus that stuck his aquiline nose where it didn’t belong, or so he was generally reminded through uncreative, underhanded compliments from the crescent mouths of his countrymen time and again.

He’d long been promised a seat in the Magisterium; a comfortable life filled with wealth, power, the best education, and endless days of unbridled unhappiness in an arranged marriage to some poor noble girl that’d likely been promised the same curse.  But, no. _Ohh, no…_ Dorian just had to have his sights set on a bloody valiant _prince._

Dorian choked back another frustrated sob and sat heavily against the wall, facing Cullen’s body once more.  He had nothing with which to discern the passing of time; no windows, no notched candles. He wondered morbidly, how long before he'd wilt from starvation or thirst, or simply succumb to madness, flinching at shadows.  Even more darkly, he wondered if his narrow boot dagger was kept on his person as some sort of kindness from his parents.

 

  
  
  



	2. Part II: The Basilisk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dorian may not be quite as alone in the crypt as it seems. What ancient power lurks within the shadows, answering his silent call of sorrow?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _“Strength was with his hands in all that he did and the feet of the strong god were untiring. From his shoulders grew a hundred heads of a snake, a fearful dragon, with dark, flickering tongues, and from under the brows of his eyes in his marvellous heads flashed fire, and fire burned from his heads as he glared. And there were voices in all his dreadful heads which uttered every kind of sound unspeakable; for at one time they made sounds such that the gods understood, but at another, the noise of a bull bellowing aloud in proud ungovernable fury; and at another, the sound of a lion, relentless of heart; and at another, sounds like whelps, wonderful to hear; and again, at another, he would hiss, so that the high mountains re-echoed.”_
> 
> \- Hesiod (speaking of Typhon/Typhoeus, the God of monsters)

  
  
  
  


Something caused Dorian to stir awake, slowly peeling him away from an empty, dreamless sleep.  It was a strange, almost-shiver, akin to the feeling of Cullen’s fingers lightly tracing down the ridges of his bare spine when his husband would wake well before him.  But this wasn’t Cullen’s touch, and Dorian hadn’t been sleeping soundly in their bed.

He groaned against the pain of a crick in his neck from how he’d fallen asleep against the unforgiving stone wall and as he shifted, his arse and legs tingled with pins and needles from nearly falling asleep, themselves.  Dorian’s stomach complained with a grumble of its own against his growing starvation, though there was nothing he could do about that, so he pointedly ignored the gnawing, empty sensation. He leaned away from the wall then rolled his shoulders back and tilted his head from side to side, grimacing with the strained stiffness he felt along his entire back.  He must’ve been out longer than he’d imagined. Despite the bit he dozed, weariness and exhaustion still clung to his bones and weighed down his already dampened mood.

While running his fingers through his hair, smoothing small tangles as a means to occupy his mind, his fingers brushed the collar around his neck, metal warm from his body heat.  Dorian sighed and tugged weakly at it, resigning to his fate ever more as the minutes burned on. His only consolation was knowing that his parents thought his magical talents too strong against whatever wards they’d used to seal the door of the crypt shut, so they must've felt the need to enlist the aid of this damnable collar to tamp down any hope for escape.  It was the one thing about him they’d always commended - something bred into him from _their_ blood, of course.

A quiet rustling sound across the room caught Dorian’s attention, and he unknowingly halted his breathing, listening for it again, and again it came.  His heart leapt in his chest.

Rats, perhaps?  Dorian’s rational mind wrinkled its nose up at the oddly reassuring thought that these Southerners couldn’t even hire decent Chantry fossors or groundskeepers for their most dearly departed!

The pale green of the insufficient number of veilfire torches around the room was too sparse to properly cast light in some of the corners and the statue-inhabited alcoves along one wall.  The strange sound reached his ears again, like heavy, rough cloth being dragged along stone, but this time, the sound did not cease; it merely changed in muffled increments as if from forward movement.  Dorian’s pulse quickened and his eyes darted from one blanket of shadow to the next, trying to perceive from whence the sound travelled. He hated himself for peering up at Cullen’s body, but it lay just as painfully still as ever.

Just as the sound began to turnover into a smoother note, two pale, sun-yellow pinpoints glimmered from the darkness.  They bobbed and swayed from side-to-side in a patient, fluid motion. Dorian’s face felt suddenly too hot, his skin too tight, his lungs too small.  He reached for his dagger, trembling fingers wrapping around the carved ebony hilt, carefully sliding it from out of his boot. Dorian’s breath hitched as the largest serpent he’d ever seen slithered into the light.

In full illumination, Dorian saw that this was no ordinary snake - above its fiery amber eyes were small horns, not much more than an inch long.  The spiraling, bony protrusions shone in the torchlight like tacky, freshly melted wax; its smooth scales were glossy with dark, reticulated patterns resembling burns marring pale wood.  It had to be nearly four metres in length, and Dorian was frozen in place as it rose in front of him, somehow hefting its large girth from the granite floor with ease to slowly tower before Dorian’s seated form.  It was mesmerisingly beautiful, and Dorian was terrified.

The serpent stared on at him inquisitively, pale pink tongue reflecting green each time it flickered from its smiling mouth.  With its pointed snout leading the way, the serpent dipped its head towards Dorian and he instinctively called forth his magic, wincing when the collar bit back his pool of mana like an electrical shock surging through his veins.  His eyes screwed shut and when he opened them, the large snake’s flaming eyes were staring into his own, so close its tongue ribboned out to brush the very tip of his nose.

Dorian gasped and reared back, scuttling away in vain as his back hit the wall behind him instantly.  He lashed out blindly with his dagger, silently praying to the Maker that the magical charm on it was not somehow ruined by the collar around his neck.  The serpent let out a pained hiss of air that rattled through the room when Dorian sloppily slashed at its belly. His other arm hovered in front of his face protectively and he took his moment to cleanly slice through the serpent as it coiled its head back.  Dorian saw the spark of purple magic ripple through the snake’s flesh in pursuit of the blade that bisected it, crunching through spiny ribs and the joints in its vertebrae. Blood splattered in crimson streaks along the sleeve of his robes and painted the floor beneath him.

The acrid smell of sulfur began permeating the room, but before Dorian’s body could react with a gag, the serpent’s tail whipped across the ground into the glowing pool of veilfire - only it wasn’t a tail, _not exactly._ Dorian watched in horror as another horned head, the mirror image of the first, danced into view.  It bared its slimy pink mouth - large, needling fangs extending outward. The serpent recoiled, then pushed forward as if it were taunting Dorian.  Light caught the glimmering drip of venom from its fangs, pebbling onto the stone where each droplet fell while it moved.

Dorian counted his breaths and pulled upon his close-combat training, thankful he excelled at being a battlemage.  If he was going to die down here, it would _not_ be due to the agonising necrosis of his flesh while his heart fought through shock until it exploded.  He didn't know what strength the poison of this snake held, but he'd take no chances. Slowly, he moved into a crouch and watched the large snake’s back and forth waltz with adrenaline-fueled hyper-awareness until it seemed it would strike.  Dorian feinted right then quickly tossed his miséricorde into his left hand and swiftly decapitated the other end of the snake. The head bounced away from its body grotesquely, landing on the cusp of torchlight and shadow on the floor.

Blood pooled from each severed end and steamed in strange wisps along the cool granite.  Dorian fell back on his haunches, letting his dagger drop from his hand with a sharp, echoing clatter.   _“Kevesh…_ if things weren’t bad enough… how wrong you were, Dorian.  Brilliant! And now you’re speaking to yourself, not that speaking to your deceased husband was any better…”

Dorian slung his arms over his knees as he drew his legs up towards his chest and let his head hang, trying to calm his breathing and rapidly beating heart.

_“Thou wouldst see him live once more, Child of the Serpent?”_

Dorian’s head snapped up at the whisper and there was nothing he could do in that moment but watch the macabre tableau that played out before him.

From the first head of the large snake, grew several inches of new tail from its severed body’s stump, and likewise from the secondary head, though that half needed to grow more than a foot of slithering muscle, it seemed.  Watching the headless, bloody segment grow a scaled skull anew however, made Dorian turn his head away with a horrified grimace.

_“Tis fine.”_

_“Aye, we did want this!”_

The voice dispersed into a strange echo of itself, sounding neither male nor female in tone, but somehow both, overlapping in a hissed, hushed way one might use when gossiping behind another’s back with a friend.  The voices never stayed quite the same, but changed in octave and accented cadence slightly.

Dorian flinched and turned his head towards the three serpents.  “What is it you want from me? Come to put me out of my misery, have you then?”  He thought he heard one of the voices _giggle._

 _“Necessary!”_ Came the hurried rasp of one voice, and Dorian realised they were speaking within his mind.  He wasn’t sure he wanted to ask himself if things could get any more peculiar.

_“Thy heart doest not lie.”_

_“We now knoweth.  Nay, we bringeth upon thee no further harm nor fright.”_

Dorian eyed the deep red pools of blood before him, sticky on the stone floor with their aberrant blood-reek, and watched the way the three heart-shaped heads edged through it to slink towards his boots.  No further fright, his perfect arse! He scoffed. “Why are you here, then? You… you let me _maim_ you, though clearly that was all pointless, yet you claim you mean _me_ no harm.  I’ve a mind to believe you were put here by my dear _parents_ as just another means to drive me mad!  So I demand answers. What are you?”

_“Amphista.”_

_“Ophion.”_

_“Amphivena!”_

_“Kerastes… we art known, but thou know’st nothing.”_

Dorian cocked a skeptical brow at the middle serpent, who seemed to be addressing him with its gaze.  “I know nothing… Yes, why do you think I _asked?_ Nevermind, I’m not arguing with… _snakes._ One of those names you gave me,” Dorian stroked his stubbled jaw nervously. “like _Carastes_ in Tevinter?”  The pronunciation on the snakes’... tongue, was slightly different, but this couldn’t be simple coincidence.  

_“We art of thee.  Borne of thy grief... and thee, Child of the Serpent, born of the city whence forth we were created.”_

_“We… are_ **_you_ ** _,”_ one voice spoke more plainly.

The serpents to the right and left of Dorian danced beneath the veilfire glow almost impatiently.  Dorian tried not to shrink back against the wall. Were these things some sort of _familiar_ to him then?  He’d only read of them in ancient Arcanum texts; elaborate myths to be shared along with cautionary tales of blood magic rituals and abominations.  Wishing now that the bored, teenage scholar he used to be retained _all_ informations pored over, seemingly useless or no, Dorian scoured his brain for any thread of hope he might decipher what this all implied.  But, he came up empty handed, mostly thanks to his nerves and being studied by six reptilian eyes.

“Can you read my thoughts?” he blurted. “You speak to me in my mind.”

The quiet, mocking laugh sounded off in Dorian’s head again, and gooseflesh sprung up along his skin.

 _“Nay.  Tis not exactly as such,”_ the voices began, whispering over each other.   _“We shant reveal more than thee needeth know.”_ Oh, right... perfect.

_“Thou know’st the tale of Dracona, yes?  Slain for riches, insurmountable. Twas by gauntleted hands on enchanted Nevarran swords and axes…”_

_“And Tevinter magicks of spirit and ice that brought her down amongst the sand and billow, aye!”_

_“What thou doest not know… those whom so worshipped Dracona watched her mistress’s blood mingle with the salt of the Nocen as the Sea taketh her body.  Thus the tribe drank of its depths and did sweareth vengeance on her soul with the fire of her blood mixing with their own.”_

_“So born was their undying allegiance, as we were from her blood, spilt.  And so, we didst rise with it from the water deep and presently, doth from tears that flow as the Sea had that day.  Thy tears, O’ Child.”_

Fatigue seeped into Dorian’s entire being as he tried to piece together what these damnable creatures were trying to tell him - if he wasn’t experiencing some deranged, vivid nightmare of course.  Then again, he hadn’t dreamt since he’d been collared, so there was _that._

“Yes, that’s all well and good, but what’s that got to do with _me?”_ he asked.  Dorian was about to tell the serpents he had no time for this _kaffas,_ but he supposed time was all he really had left while it lasted.  Best not anger the amicable company…

_“Thy country is one that bears the malison of Dracona!  But those whose hearts beat with her blood still, those purest and truest of heart and will…”_

_“Thou art descended from the protectors of the old kingdom of Carastes.  Thou hold’st no curse as thy parents.”_

_“Betrayers!”_

Suddenly, the snake to Dorian’s left let out a spitting hiss and lunged towards the one to his right, as if in reprimand to keep its opinions to itself.  He covered the smirk on his face by fixing the curl in his moustache. “Cursed by a _dragon,_ you say?   _Why_ am I not surprised?  So, let me get this straight, you’ve come to _me_ because I am a descendant of some ancient tribe in Carastes who worshipped the legendary Dracona.  And _you_ were born of her blood, which my ancestors also… drank…  Well, I certainly see now where my _penchant_ for drinking things I _shouldn’t_ comes from.”

_“Aye, Child!  Thou art a mage with her power flowing within!  We merely protect and guide thee.”_

“And this all ties us together into a neat little package with a pretty blood-red ribbon, yes?  Does this mean you can get me out of this place, then?” Dorian couldn’t help the hopeful lilt in his voice.  He also didn’t much care for the comfort with which he now spoke to these mystic serpents.

_“Ah… tis not so easy.  The one who can undo the bonds which hold thee is too the one thy heart doest belongeth.”_

Dorian’s throat tightened and he looked passed his visitors to the dais that held Cullen’s enshrouded body upon his deep stone coffin.  “I… I’m not certain you’ve noticed, but...” He gestured in the direction of Cullen and swallowed a knotted lump down. “My husband is a little preoccupied with _death_ at the moment and all that.” A grimaced smile worked its way across Dorian’s face briefly.

The middle serpent swung its body forward until it was nearly nose-to-nose with Dorian.   _“Three, and three, and three!  We haven come to free thee, whose heart doth bleed tears like the Sea!”_ they all chimed together in an uneven, whispered cacophony and it raised the hair on the back of Dorian’s neck.

_“Taketh thy blood, and with it the magicks within; the ichor of our mouths which fell all but thee; and finally the baned blood of thy twin flame.  Each droplet upon thy bodkin to meet the brimstone of our own blood, thrice and no more, no less.”_

Dorian gaped.  “What are you saying?  Do you mean to ask me to perform _blood magic?!_ I most certainly will not!  And not only that, but the very suggestion that I…” He scoffed at the serpents, disgusted, and turned away from them with a deep scowl. “That I… _desecrate my husband’s corpse!”_  Standing, Dorian gesticulated angrily at his scaley audience, needing to feel in control of the situation as he now towered over their lithe bodies. _“I won’t!_ Ask anything of me, _anything but that!_  I’d rather rot down here with him than…”

Dorian braced himself with one arm against the wall and dragged fingers back through his inky mane.  He felt dizzy with it all. If blood magic and taking the poisoned blood from Cullen was his way out of the crypt, he’d die happily over using any essence of his late husband in a selfish ritual.  He took a vow long before the one he made to Cullen, that he’d never succumb to the temptations so prevalent amongst his countrymen.

_“Silence, O’ Child of the Serpent!”_

_“We mean not to force thy hand against that which will taint thee.”_

_“We mean to bringeth him from whence his soul wanders without body.  Tis not a ritual of darkness and temptations thou so shields thyself from, nay.  The lion’s jaws are thus the only way to break the chains which hold and suffocate thee.  Once broken, thy magic shall flow once more as a river of Flame to melt the bars of thy cage.”_

_“Trustttt in ussss!”_

To have Cullen back in his life, to feel him and breathe him in again; be surrounded by his warmth - _that_ was a temptation Dorian knew no way of circumventing.  But what if…

“Will he be as he was?  Will Cullen be _himself_ or simply some... _spectre_ wearing his flesh?” he asked hurriedly.

The middle serpent slithered away and around the largest puddle of its blood and seemed to look at Dorian imploringly, though its horns lent a constant sinister look to it and each of its mirror images.

Pulling up his robes so as not to drag the hem in the blood, Dorian stepped forward to meet the serpent.  A sincere, haunting voice reverberated in his mind as he did so. _“Death will be undone, and thy love returned unto thee whole as he once was.”_

 _“But we ask of thee a blood price.”_ They called together as another snake weaved its way behind Dorian.

He eyed each serpent with lingering skepticism.  “Yes, yes, my blood, Cullen’s blood-”

 _“Nay!”_ The voices silenced him.   _“We shall giveth a life, pure and whole, at the cost of another, cursed one.”_

_“Wait not before the end of Drakonis or we will have no choice but to taketh back that which was given.”_

Dorian crossed one arm over his chest and brought his other hand up to perch beneath his jaw.  Impatience began wearing on him as thick as his hunger. So, a little over a month then. The time table shouldn’t be much of a problem so long as he and Cullen truly could escape from here.   _Escape with Cullen._ The thought warmed Dorian and he didn’t have to think long on exactly who he’d trade for Cullen.  “A cursed life? _I’ll give you two._  Now, let’s get on with this, yes?”

_“The charm on thy bodkin shall cut through the curtain preserving thy prince and his flesh.”_

_“Gather, O’ Child!”_

Ah yes, good call, that.  Cullen’s body was afterall, being kept from decomposing with a temporary preservation spell protecting it.  Once it wore off, he’d be truly laid to rest within his royal tomb and the commissioned stone effigy put in place upon the pedestal-like coffin instead.  What a surprise those coming to handle Cullen’s corpse would find with these magically sealed doors! Of course, Dorian would be long dead by that time from thirst.

Well, so long as all went according to this odd plan, he wouldn’t have such things to worry about.

Dorian knelt down in front of the largest pool of blood before him; the stench of sulfur still wafting from its deep crimson stain.  He supposed he should be surprised it hadn’t yet begun congealing, but… _stranger things were happening._

With the point of his dagger, Dorian pricked the tip of his middle finger.  He winced slightly as he pinched the sides of the wound with his other hand.  The flow of blood was slow due to his increasing dehydration, but Dorian was nearly thankful as it made the precision of only three drops easier on his shaking hands.

Each droplet fell into the serpents’ blood with a little puff of glowing purple smoke.  That had to be a good sign, right?

Next, he stood on wobbly legs and walked over to Cullen’s body.  A tired sigh left Dorian and he begged his husband’s forgiveness while lifting the velvet shroud from Cullen’s left hand like he had so very recently.  Cullen’s matching fede ring still shone beautifully in the dim torchlight. Dorian couldn’t wait to feel the heat of Cullen’s hand in his own - it couldn’t come soon enough so he sucked in a breath and made a tiny cut along the pad of Cullen’s ring finger.  

It was painfully slow going, collecting Cullen’s blood that had long gone stagnant within his body.  It was nearly black and viscous like molasses. Dorian collected it with a renewed sadness encasing him.   _By the Maker, this had better work,_ he thought.

A low, condescending peal of laughter resounded.   _“Worry not.  We have woven the pattern of thy destiny and this is not to be thy Fate, Child of the Serpent.  And just as his thread hath been cut, it shall be mended anew.”_

Dorian peered over his shoulder at the serpents as he gathered the last oozing droplet of Cullen’s blood onto the tip of his dagger.  “Yes, well I’d better not become some blighted _maleficar_ after this either.”

With the last bit of blood added to the snakes’ own, Dorian now had the task of seemingly extracting venom from one of them, or perhaps all of them?

“So,” he started, nervously. “how do you propose I gather your _ichor,_ my dear friends?”

 _“Thy blade handle,”_ one whispered into his thoughts just as the serpent nearest him moved in close to Dorian and lifted its head from the ground.

“Oh goody, a _volunteer.”_  Dorian grasped the blade loosely in his palm and extended the handle towards the reptile.  “Now, what is it I’m - _Venhedis!”_

The serpent struck out at the handle of the dagger and Dorian nearly dropped it before slicing his palm as he grasped the bladed end.  It more than smarted, but Dorian quickly became lost in fascination watching the snake’s mouth wriggle around the carved wood, until it was pressing the shiny pink flesh behind its fangs against the handle.  Ah, yes… Dorian could recall from his youth seeing the peculiar apothecaries amongst other street vendors milking snake venom for various concoctions and “potions” right there in the market streets of Qarinus.

_“Dally not!  Over the blood.  Only thrice!”_

Dorian held his breath and carefully directed the snake’ head over the puddle of blood.  Every muscle in his body tensed while he watched that pink mouth resituate itself once more over his dagger handle.  One clear droplet came freely; pale green smoke in its wake as it hit the blood. Dorian thought it curious how each liquid brought a different coloured smoke - Cullen’s blood had created a vibrant, crystalline blue wisp.

The second drop of venom fell soon after, but then Dorian felt warmth trickle from his sliced palm to the knob of his wrist.  Dorian eyed the thin, translucent needled teeth of the serpent, praying for another drop before his own blood fell and ruined the spell.  What would happen then? They’d told him no more than three droplets, and no less. If a fourth drop of his blood was added, would the alchemy be utterly ruined?  Could he start over - no, would these snakes even offer him _more_ of their own blood if he mucked this all up?

Just then, the third drip of venom hit the blood.  The serpent reeled away and Dorian tossed his dagger to wrap his bleeding hand in his robes.  He thought he’d burn them after today. Yes, that sounded good.

He stood and watched as the snake blood rippled in three points until three leaves rose forth.  The blood trickled over the shape of each one, revealing more green. Soon, the blood seemed to pull away from the leaves as if there were some barrier repelling it.

What in the Void was he supposed to do with _leaves?_ They looked innocuous enough, almost resembling large mint leaves.  He looked around at the serpents, but they only seemed to peer back expectantly, pointed snouts tipped up to him.  Dorian carefully plucked each leaf up with his bad hand, careful not to get blood on them as he lay them in his clean palm.

_“Hold thy hands together.”_

_“Ah, yesss!”_

Dorian quirked an eyebrow, but did as he was told, not yet wanting to fully admit that these anomalous snakes were in charge here.  He held the soft leaves sandwiched between his palms until he felt a small jolt of pain in his cut. When Dorian opened his hands, he saw the wound was closed, though the blood remained.  The seafoam green of the three leaves were unmarred and pristine. Truly, Dorian was struck dumb. So they could heal, but could they really reverse _death?_

 _“Three, and three, and three!”_ The serpents began again, voices hissing and clamouring over each other.  They slithered passed Dorian’s feet, nearly tripping him as they danced excitedly towards where Cullen lay.  Dorian followed, cupping the leaves between his hands as if they were the most precious objects he’d ever held - and maybe they were.

_“Three, and three, and three...  The leaves thee shall taketh and place forth upon his eyes to see and chest for heart and lungs that beat and breathe.”_

Dorian approached Cullen’s body and asked the serpents, “When he wakes, how is it we’re to escape?  You’ve implied he can rid me of this collar, but not _how_ exactly.”

_“A Knight of the Order no longer, aye… but the blue still sings inside him.  Thou must drinketh from that well.”_

“The lyrium?  But he stopped that long-”

 _“Quickly, quickly!”_ the serpents whispered vehemently.

“Damnit!  This all better fucking work or I’ll find some way to haunt you…” Dorian sneered down at them then pulled back the scarlet shroud from Cullen’s countenance.

_“Steady…”_

_“We art beholden to thee, as thou art unto us.”_

_“There is nothing left to be afeard, Dorian.”_ The last voice was singular and soothing in its clarity; a balm as Dorian choked back tears at seeing Cullen’s pale face, devoid of any glow of life lurking within.

He placed a leaf upon each of Cullen’s eyelids, heavy as if with sleep.  Dorian let the tears fall from his own eyes while a blinding hope warred with the realist inside of him.   _This may not work you fool.  You may soon be just as dead as your beloved,_ Dorian scolded himself.

In the closest thing to unison the serpents’ voices could achieve, they spoke in the tongue of the country from which they, and Dorian, were born.   _“Na via lerno victoria.”_

Dorian sniffed back more tears and nodded, wiping his cheeks with the back of his free hand, mindful not to smear blood on his face. “Yes… Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

_“Thou wilt succeed, and hereupon saveth the leaves for thine own vengeance, aye.”_

_“Return the bane upon which was cast unto thee and thy ‘sweeting.’”_

_“A drink, mayhaps?”_

Heeding the serpents’ conspiratorial words as they haunted his mind, Dorian placed the last leaf over Cullen’s still heart, in the middle of his golden circlet.

For a good long moment, it seemed as though Dorian’s fears would not be assuaged, but soon he heard the drag of the serpents’ bodies behind him and he turned to watch as they each slinked away towards their still-wet sanguine puddles.

With their reptilian sway, they ran their bodies through the blood, staining their pale bellies.  Together they hissed out, _“Alive!  Alive!”_  And without warning, the serpents quickly dissipated into a melt of violet fog that curled over the blood until it was all a dry, rusty stain; as if the very granite beneath Dorian’s feet had somehow absorbed its evidence.

A gasping, sputtering breath came from behind Dorian and he spun ‘round to see the leaves dancing over Cullen’s fluttering eyelids and his quaking chest as a few more coughs left his lungs.  Dorian felt faint with the mixture of emotions roiling inside of him. He hurriedly plucked the three leaves from Cullen’s face and chest and carefully stuffed them into an inside pocket of his dark robes.

The moment Cullen opened his eyes, he trained that beautiful ochre colour on Dorian and rose into a seated position with one arm braced behind him.  The circlet fell to the floor in a small clatter and the shroud Cullen had been swathed in slipped to drape around his hips, revealing the gold and silver shine of his decorative royal armour.

“Dorian?” The usual calm timbre of Cullen’s voice was edged in panic.

Dorian rushed to his side and lifted himself to sit atop the coffin beside his husband.   The deathly pallor in Cullen’s face pinkened as life sang through him and Dorian could not stop his hands from reaching out to grasp the sides of his face.  He sighed, feeling the lively warmth now emanating from Cullen’s skin and pressed their foreheads together, closing his eyes tight.

“They gave you back to me,” Dorian breathed. _“My darling amatus, you really are alive.”_

“I don’t know how, but I knew I was dead, Dorian.  I knew it, but… How can this be? Are we in the Fade?”  Dorian chuckled lightly at Cullen’s question and leaned back, opening his eyes to take in his husband’s face again.

“No, this is very much reality, however _strange_ it may seem,” he answered and carded his fingers through Cullen’s hair.  The ashen colour of his blond waves that came with death had returned to a more golden wheat once more.

Cullen’s eyes flit about the room then he grasped Dorian’s wrists.   _“Your parents,”_ he grit out and narrowed his eyes.  “I’d… missed you while you were away, so I had a couple glasses of wine to help me sleep one night.  I hadn’t realised I’d grabbed the bottle they’d sent us until the next day when I felt dreadfully sick.  I’m _sure_ it was that.  Dorian, they-”  Pulling off his gloves, Cullen let his bare fingers trace the metal around Dorian’s neck.  “What is this?”

Dorian shrugged half-heartedly.  “My suspicions were much as your own.  But this collar confirms it… as does the fact that they had me dumped here after dosing me with _magebane_ at your funeral, only to lock the doors to your crypt room with magicks I can’t even touch.”

Cullen frowned.  “Dorian, what are you saying?”

“What I’m saying is that we are _trapped down here, my darling._ And my doting parents had seen to it that I die of dehydration or starvation down here with… your body as a reminder of the power they still hold over me, I’m sure.  The collar cuts off my connection to the Fade - I can’t even light a spark between my fingers.”

Swinging his legs over the edge of the coffin, Cullen stood and stepped off the dais.   “Where are the doors?” He left Dorian still sitting, bemused, as he walked away. “You said they were magically locked - perhaps I can clear it of the spell.” Cullen spun for a moment, looking around, trying to orient himself before he noticed the dark hall to the doors.

“Cullen, wait.”  Dorian stood. “Your abilities from the Order’s lyrium, you still have them?”

Cullen nodded, still looking down the hall.  “Yes, but they’re weaker than they were when I was taking it.  No one knows for certain how long a Knight keeps his abilities after stopping… well, they usually don’t make it through the withdrawal.”

“And look at you, defying a myriad of odds over and over.” Dorian smiled proudly at Cullen.  “But even so, if your abilities aren’t what they were… Cullen, the wards sealing the doors are strong.  It’s my parents’ magicks, I can sense them when I’m near it.”

Taking off down the hall at a jog, Cullen called back to him, “I have to try!”

As Dorian was about to take off after him, he walked passed the dark stain on the floor and recalled something the serpents had told him.   _The blue still sings inside him.  Thou must drinketh from that well._

Dorian caught up with Cullen (and then tried to catch his breath) in front of the tall, foreboding wooden doors and watched his husband run his hands over the wood and ironwork.  Dorian could see the ripple of green as Cullen’s hands moved, but knew a Knight Templar did not sense magic in the ways a mage did.

“Venhedis, you’re feeling awfully _spry_ for someone who’s just come back from the dead!” Dorian panted.

Turning a smirk on him, Cullen told Dorian, “I feel as though I’m twenty again.  Now, stand back a little ways. I’m not sure how the wards will react to me cleansing the magic… and collar or no, I don’t want to add to the drain of your mana or affect you in any way if things go awry.”

“Mm, I can think of _better_ ways you could affect or drain me, amatus.”

Cullen smiled again.  “Later, once we’re out of here and back to the comfort of home, yes?”  Dorian nodded at him with a smile of his own and stepped back, giving Cullen the safe distance he requested.

Blue flashed beneath Cullen’s palms but, it was a fruitless endeavour.  Cullen stumbled back as the doors glowed with a radiating, angry green as if to ask, _how dare you try to break me?_ Cullen righted himself, but hung his head in defeat.

Dorian decided to let himself fall into the arms of hope one last time.

He brushed a hand along the cool metal of Cullen’s pauldron until his fingers met the heated flesh of the nape of his neck.  “Husband of mine, a suggestion if I may?” Cullen faced him, still looking quite grim at his failure to free them. “Your abilities may not be enough to break through the wards on this door, but I think you may be able to purge whatever spells are holding this blighted contraption closed.” Dorian grasped the offending piece of jewelry for dramatic flair.  “I think… I’ll explain better later, but long story short, serpent _familiars_ of mine came to my aid.  Well, _a_ serpent until I _\- doesn’t matter -_ they’re what gave me the means to bring you back.  And I believe they made mention of something of your abilities and perhaps me making use of them in order for us to get out of here.  

“If you can get this collar off me, I think I could perhaps pull from the lyrium within you to boost my own mana and get these doors open.”

“Dorian, do you think that’s even _safe?”_ Cullen implored warily.

“As opposed to what?  Waiting until we keel over down here?  Hope we’re found by the fossers before that?  If _they_ can even manage to get through the wards…  No, come on. I don’t know if there are any seams or sigils upon the metal that you might find useful, but it’s worth a look.”  Dorian walked away to find a torch and beckoned Cullen to follow.

As they rounded the corner into the crypt room proper, Cullen stopped before meeting Dorian beneath the light of veilfire.  He cocked an eyebrow and crossed his arms over his cuirass. “Are you _sure_ we aren’t in the Fade, love?  This is all a bit, uh… hard to swallow.”

Dorian mirrored his husband and crossed his arms as well, but rolled his eyes at him.  “Yes, _I’m sure!_ Now stop asking questions and come over here and put your hands on me,” he snarled.

A playful smile curled Cullen’s mouth.  “Such orders my husband gives me. And in what tone!”  Finally, he walked over to Dorian and ran the hem of the soft silk neck of his robes between his fingers.  Tentatively, Cullen moved on to the hard metal of the collar, carefully examining it in the torchlight.

Dorian huffed.  “Yes, well you like it when I take charge, _don’t you?”_

Cullen kept his eyes trained on the mysterious metal, but their proximity was daunting on Dorian’s emotions.   _“I do,”_ Cullen answered absently.  “There are two tight seams, but not much else I can discern along the entire thing.  I assume that’s how it’s being held together.” He spun the metal around until each seam rested on either side of Dorian’s neck.  

Cullen’s hands cupped the sides of the collar and the touch felt intimate on Dorian’s skin and calmed his nervous pulse.  Their eyes met and Cullen licked his lips as his brow furrowed. “I’ll try to find the binds holding the metal together and then hopefully purge the spell right after.  I’ll try to be as quick as possible, but this might… feel a little uncomfortable.”

“Maybe you should distract me, mm?” Dorian smiled wolfishly.

 _“Maker’s breath,_ I missed you, Dorian… Though it can’t have been terribly long, I feel like I’ve spent ages fumbling in the dark for you.  And I- I can’t imagine what you’ve gone through since-”

Silencing Cullen with fingertips to his scarred mouth, Dorian shook his head.  “It’s over, sweeting. _It’s over.”_

Cullen tipped his head up to place a kiss against Dorian’s forehead and murmured against his skin, “From now on, wherever we go, we go together.”

“Lead and I’ll follow, _my liege.”_ Dorian’s laugh was soon cut off by Cullen’s mouth swiftly covering his own.  His brows knit as he poured his heart into the kiss despite the burning pain that had begun lancing the flesh of his neck and threatened to claw its way up his throat like bile.

Cullen’s hands seemed to vibrate with the effort.  He swallowed down any noises of discomfort from Dorian as his tongue lapped into his mouth.  Dorian’s knees began to buckle from the pain and he could swear he felt something inside of him begging to reach out for the formerly dormant lyrium within Cullen’s body as they kissed.

With an overwhelming relief, the collar fell away from Dorian’s neck.  A tinny, metallic _thunk_ echoed off the walls twice as each half dropped to the stone floor and soon, Cullen’s hands were at Dorian’s jaw, fingers tucking behind his ears and into his long hair.  Cullen continued to kiss him with all the ferocity of his animalistic namesake as bright blue light filled the blackness behind Dorian’s eyelids.

Like the moon pulling at the tides, Dorian’s very soul seemed to grab onto the power Cullen thrust into him and tugged and _tugged._ He felt his magic rise up to begin filling him like cool water, but more than that, Dorian felt Cullen’s love coursing through him.  That was one power he’d never again want to do without.

They parted with Cullen still clinging desperately to him.  Dorian lightly nudged his nose against Cullen’s, silently pleading for more of his mouth until Cullen straightened and spoke.  “Let’s get out of here.”

Dorian could think of no argument to that.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This.Chapter.Was.So.Daunting.
> 
> Ugh, I really hope it paid off! I wanted the serpent(s) to echo inspiration of different serpents/snake-like monsters and creatures of Greek mythology and their respective backgrounds - from the infamous Hydra defeated by Heracles, to the Basilisk, and the Gorgons born of Medusa's blood, and many others. Therefore, I wanted the way they spoke to lend to the idea that they have been around in this universe I created, for a very, very long time. I also have this idea that though they've been separated into three snakes by Dorian's hand, they are truly one ancient being, with a kind of hive-mind.
> 
> Fun Fact #2: Cerastes is a real-life genus of horned viper, but also a mythological horned serpent from Ancient Greece (and spelled with a "K"). Bioware devs *had* to have been inspired to name the Tevinter city of Carastes for it in some way, what with all the dragon/serpent imagery surrounding the country. ::shrug:: I had fun with the possibility, either way! 
> 
> Kudos and feedback always appreciated! And thank you to those sticking with this AU of mine while I wear my ancient-history-nerd-heart on my sleeve!

**Author's Note:**

> Fun Fact: Phlegethon (or Pyriphlegethon) is a river of fire in Haides :)
> 
> I promise this will have a HEA! I can't make my OTP suffer for too long. For what I've got planned, this story _should_ be only three parts, but we shall seeee, because story length never really goes as I plan haha. I hope whoever has taken the time to read is enjoying my weird little AU so far, because shit's only going to get stranger...
> 
> Comments, feedback, & kudos are my fuel<3
> 
> And points to whomever can pick out my nerdy Greek mythology nods throughout all of this story lol


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